1. Technical Field
This document relates to systems and methods for improving reading accuracy, efficiency, and retention, particularly for readers of complex, technical, or specialized text.
2. Background Information
A large part of the communication and information in health care, including the exchange between patients and physicians, and among physicians collaborating in the care of a patient, is encoded in natural spoken language in text form (e.g., English).
Health care professionals, through their education, exhibit good reading performance in general. However, once professionals graduate from formal education settings, there are few reasons or opportunities to assess one's accuracy or efficiency in reading such medical texts.
Moreover, the systematic use of such medical texts in the delivery of health care services, including contexts that constrain time allowed for reading the texts, assumes that reading performance among the individuals using the texts is already standardized, and reasonably homogenous across the working group and over the entire spectrum of health care delivery circumstances and time segments.
Variations in reading performance, in speed and/or accuracy, can lead to unexpected variations in health care outcomes—through delays, misinterpretation, or incomplete understanding of medical text content.